


Henry, Your Heart is so Cold

by ThePrincePeach



Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: Angst, Creepy, Other, not sure what to tag this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:53:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22488961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePrincePeach/pseuds/ThePrincePeach
Summary: A room is full of caskets and the one that was empty practically begged for his return.
Relationships: Joey Drew/Henry Stein
Kudos: 31





	Henry, Your Heart is so Cold

A room is full of caskets, each beautiful in terms of care and woodwork and framing, all differently sized to suit whatever could be inside of them. He wanted to believe there was something other than the obvious in the closed caskets – but he knew better than that. He sighed slowly and carefully and watched as his breath turned into a puffy, foggy, white cloud that dissipated quickly after it parted from his cold lips. Everything was cold. It was snowing inside of the room. Pretty and untouched snow was spread across the old wooden floorboards, patches of the floor below showing briefly. Humorous snowflakes fell gently from above; delicate but fat, fluttering carelessly and landing where they pleased on the floor, on the caskets, on the man. It littered his hair and shoulders and clothes, he brushed it off his cheeks slowly with numbing fingers. 

A room is full of caskets and the one that was empty practically begged for his return. He rubbed his arm and felt his goosebumps, felt his cold skin, felt the damp of the snow creeping through his sleeves – he felt. It was odd to feel. Nothing felt real. He stepped forward ever so slowly. The first step into untouched snow reminded him of the first streak of paint against a canvas; it wouldn’t be impossible to rid the first mark if it was wrong, but you’d always know it was there. 

Henry missed painting in the sunroom. 

His eyes scanned across the caskets, one by one, as he trudged his way past them. He didn’t bother to hold himself, he would remain cold anyway. Where he wanted to believe the snow had seeped in through his clothes, through the empty pores of his skin, and frozen his heart to the core; he knew better than that, too. He had watched as those caskets were filled, one by one, two by two, and he stopped feeling the need to cry after the fifth or sixth one was filled and forgotten. His heart stopped jumping up to his throat after the eighth, or was it the tenth? The caskets kept filling up. He hated the counting game nowadays. At first, it was the throbbing, painful beating of the artificial heart that was transplanted into the studio; the ink machine. It pumped and bled like one, it brought life, it took it, too. Hearts could break, they could freeze, the machine always felt so warm when Henry touched it, but he never could figure out why. Maybe that was a good thing. He missed being so stupid and naive. If ignorance was bliss, Henry must have been kicked out of Eden by the bite of that promising apple. He knew too much. It hurt. It froze his heart. 

The ink machine was still pumping. He heard it through the pipes on the walls and ceiling, snaking across the place like an infection. Bu-bump, bu-bump, bu-bump. 

Henry thought he felt it through the floor. He kept his eyes on the empty casket. On his empty casket. It felt so familiar, nostalgia brought life back into his flesh the nearer he crept towards it. There was no snow on the opened lid or the plushy, velvety lining that looked so damn comfortable. How long had Henry been walking? How many times has he walked that same path? How many of those coffins were his, really? No matter what he did, it was always the same. Sleep was a joke at this point. He stopped feeling alert at some point or another, it simply dulled away into nothingness. He wasn’t tired, he was exhausted more or less. And yet, as he neared his casket, he found himself burdened with the familiar feeling of being utterly, comfortingly sleepy. His limbs pleaded for pause, his shoes would have had holes in the soles if that actually mattered here. His head swam and spun and his insides churned. He stopped feeling long before his heart turned cold. 

He reached out and grabbed the edge of his casket, peering in after a moment of hesitation. It looked comfortable, enough so to befit a king. Henry was no king. He was an animator and an idiot. He felt hands lifting him up ever so carefully and helping him into the casket, his sore and abused and exhausted body nearly melting against the velvet of the bedding inside. Turning to his side, figures looked down at him from outside. Their caskets were empty now, Henry thought. At first, he noticed Linda, Sammy then Susie beside him, Allison, Norman, Wally, Bertrum. They looked so pleased, shuffling from side to side, watching him with such delight. Like children eyeing through the candy shop window, he thought with a tired chuckle.

He saw Joey, who reached out and cupped his freckled cheeks with those familiar strong hands. Henry smiled and clasped his hands around his, nuzzling into the warmth the man provided. 

“Goodnight, Henry,” Joey cooed so sweetly, pulling his hands away slowly. Henry laid back into his casket and his smile grew as he relaxed further and further. His eyelids were getting heavy and fluttering, he felt himself dripping in and out of consciousness. Before his eyes shut, the casket door turned upwards and closed with a silent groan. 

“Goodnight,” Henry whispered, the silence swallowing up his words, “goodnight. Goodnight… 

“Goodnight… 

“…Goodbye.”

The studio was emptied and thirty years later, the casket door opened. 

"Alright, Joey. I'm here. Let's see if we can find what you wanted me to see."

**Author's Note:**

> Just something short I wanted to write. Hope you like it!


End file.
